Socioeconomic mobility in the United States
Socioeconomic mobility in the United States refers to the upward or downward movement of Americans from one social class or economic level to another, through job changes, inheritance, marriage, connections, tax changes, innovation, illegal activities, hard work, lobbying, luck, health changes or other factors.
This vertical mobility can be the change in socioeconomic status between parents and children ; or over the course of a lifetime.
Socioeconomic mobility typically refers to "relative mobility", the chance that an individual American's income or social status will rise or fall in comparison to other Americans, but can also refer to "absolute" mobility, based on changes in living standards in America.
In recent years, several studies have found that vertical intergenerational mobility is lower in the US than in some European countries. US social mobility has either remained unchanged or decreased since the 1970s. A study conducted by the Pew Charitable Trusts found that the bottom quintile is 57% likely to experience upward mobility and only 7% to experience downward mobility.
A study published in 2008 showed that economic mobility in the U.S. increased from 1950 to 1980, but has declined sharply since 1980.
A 2013 Brookings Institution study found income inequality was increasing and becoming more permanent, sharply reducing social mobility.
A large academic study released in 2014 found US mobility overall has not changed appreciably in the last 25 years, but a variety of up and down mobility changes were found in several different parts of the country. On average, American children entering the labor market today have the same chances of moving up in the income distribution as children born in the 1970s.
However, because US income inequalities have increased substantially, the consequences of the "birth lottery"—the parents to whom a child is born—are larger today than in the past. US wealth is increasingly concentrated in the top 10% of American families, so children of the remaining 90% are more likely to be born at lower starting incomes today than the same children in the past. Even if they are equally mobile and climb the same distance up the US socioeconomic ladder as children born 25 years earlier, the bottom 90% of the ladder is worth less now, so they gain less income value from their climb, especially when compared to the top 10%.
Popular perception
Many Americans strongly believe the U.S. is a "Land of Opportunity" that offers every child an equal chance at social and economic mobility. That Americans rise from humble origins to riches, has been called a "civil religion", "the bedrock upon which the American story has been anchored", and part of the American identity This theme is celebrated in the lives of famous Americans such as Benjamin Franklin and Henry Ford, and in popular culture.The American Dream Report, a study of the Economic Mobility Project, found that Americans surveyed were more likely than citizens of other countries to agree with statements like:
- "People get rewarded for intelligence and skill",
- "People get rewarded for their efforts";
- "Coming from a wealthy family is 'essential' or 'very important' to getting ahead,"
- "Income differences in my country are too large" or
- "It is the responsibility of government to reduce differences in income."
Another report found such beliefs to have gotten stronger over the last few decades.
Intergenerational mobility
Current state
The correlation between parents' income and their children's income in the United States is estimated between.4 and.6.If a parent's income had no effect on a child's opportunity for future upward mobility, approximately 20% of poor children who started in the bottom quintile would remain there as poor adults. At the other end of income spectrum, if children were born into wealthy families in the top 20%, only 20% would stay in that top income category if their mobility opportunities were equal to every other child's in the country.
But long-term income statistics show this isn't happening. Mobility opportunities are different for poor and wealthy children in the US. Parental incomes and parental choices of home locations while raising children appear to be major factors in that difference. According to a 2012 Pew Economic Mobility Project study 43% of children born into the bottom quintile remain in that bottom quintile as adults. Similarly, 40% of children raised in the top quintile will remain there as adults. Looking at larger moves, only 4% of those raised in the bottom quintile moved up to the top quintile as adults. Around twice as many of children born into the top quintile fell to the bottom. 37% of children born into the top quintile will fall below the middle. These findings have led researchers to conclude that "opportunity structures create and determine future generations' chances for success. Hence, our lot in life is at least partially determined by where we grow up, and this is partially determined by where our parents grew up, and so on."
Economic mobility may be affected by factors such as geographic location, education, genetics, culture, race, sex, and interactions among these, as well as family wealth.
Famous historical cases
Famous instances of great economic and social mobility include Benjamin Franklin and Henry Ford, Additional popular examples of upward social mobility between generations in America include Abraham Lincoln and Bill Clinton, who were born into working-class families yet achieved high political office in adult life. Andrew Carnegie, arrived in the U.S. as a poor immigrant and rose to become a steel tycoon, perhaps the wealthiest man in America, and its leading philanthropist.Comparisons with other countries
Several large studies of mobility in developed countries in recent years have found the US among the lowest in mobility. One study found that of nine developed countries, the United States and United Kingdom had the lowest intergenerational vertical social mobility with about half of the advantages of having a parent with a high income passed on to the next generation. The four countries with the lowest "intergenerational income elasticity", i.e. the highest social mobility, were Denmark, Norway, Finland, and Canada with less than 20% of advantages of having a high income parent passed on to their children. Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz contends that "Scandinavian countries changed their education systems, social policies and legal frameworks to create societies where there is a higher degree of mobility. That made their countries more into the land of opportunity that America once was."According to journalist Jason DeParle:
In 2012, a graph plotting the relationship between income inequality and intergenerational social mobility in the United States and twelve other developed countries—dubbed "The Great Gatsby Curve"—showed "a clear negative relationship" between inequality and social mobility. Countries with low levels of inequality such as Denmark, Norway and Finland had some of the greatest mobility, while the two countries with the high level of inequality—Chile and Brazil—had some of the lowest mobility. The curve was introduced in a speech by chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers Alan Krueger, and the President's Economic Report to Congress.
Philip Alston, the United Nations special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, asserted in a 2017 report on an investigation of extreme poverty in the United States that "The American Dream is rapidly becoming the American Illusion since the US now has the lowest rate of social mobility of any of the rich countries."
Absolute mobility
Even though mobility has gone down, most Americans still have more income than their parents. A 2007 study "Economic Mobility Project: Across Generations", using Panel Study of Income Dynamics, found 67% of Americans who were children in 1968 had higher levels of real family income in 1995–2002 than their parents had in 1967–1971 As to whether this figure is higher or lower than other countries is difficult to say as this type of measure has not been done for other countries.Intragenerational mobility
Another form of mobility—"intra-generational"—is the change in class and/or income experienced by individuals during their lifetime. Intra-generational mobility renders the meaning of "short-term" inequality ambiguous, since high intra-generational mobility suggests that those who are currently less well-off will move up the class or income scale later in life.How strong Intra-generational mobility is in the US is disputed. Supporting relatively high levels of intragenerational mobility, Thomas A. Garrett reported on a US Treasury study of income mobility from 1996 to 2005. This found "There was considerable income mobility of individuals in the U.S. economy during the 1996 through 2005 period as over half of taxpayers moved to a different income quintile over this period"; 80 percent of taxpayers had incomes in quintiles as high or higher in 2005 than they did in 1996, and 45 percent of taxpayers not in the highest income quintile moved up at least one quintile. Fewer than half "of those in the top 1 percent in 1996 were still in the top 1 percent in 2005. Only about 25 percent of the individuals in the top 1/100th percent in 1996 remained in the top 1/100th percent in 2005." The study reassured Americans "the opportunity for upward mobility" in America despite their concern about the "long-term trend of increasing income inequality in the U.S. economy" After-tax income of the top 1% earners has grown by 176% percent from 1979 to 2007 while it grew only 9% for the lowest 20%.
However others describe the data as reflecting less mobility. A 2007 inequality and mobility study found the pattern of annual and long-term earnings inequality "very close", and the population at top income levels in America "very stable" and had "not mitigated the dramatic increase in annual earnings concentration since the 1970s." A 2011 CBO study on "Trends in the Distribution of Household Income Between 1979 and 2007" also found multi-year household income distribution in America "only modestly" more equal than annual income.
Given the fairly substantial movement of households across income groups over time, it might seem that income measured over a number of years should be significantly more equally distributed than income measured over one year. However, much of the movement of households involves changes in income that are large enough to push households into different income groups but not large enough to greatly affect the overall distribution of income. Multi-year income measures also show the same pattern of increasing inequality over time as is observed in annual measures.
In other words, "many people who have incomes greater than $1 million one year fall out of the category the next year—but that’s typically because their income fell from, say, 1.05 million to 0.95 million, not because they went back to being middle class."
Economist Paul Krugman complains that conservatives have resorted to "extraordinary series of attempts at statistical distortion" in claiming high levels of mobility.
Studies by the Urban Institute and the US Treasury have both found that about half of the families who start in either the top or the bottom quintile of the income distribution are still there after a decade, and that only 3 to 6 percent rise from bottom to top or fall from top to bottom.
While in any given year, some of the people with low incomes will be "workers on temporary layoff, small businessmen taking writeoffs, farmers hit by bad weather"—the rise in their income in succeeding years is not the same 'mobility' as poor people rising to middle class or middle income rising to wealth. It's the mobility of "the guy who works in the college bookstore and has a real job by his early thirties."
Causes and issues
Explanations for the relatively low level of social mobility in the US include the better access of affluent children to superior schools and preparation for schools so important in an economy where pay is tilted toward educated workers; high levels of immigration of unskilled laborers and low rate of unionization, which leads to lower wages among the least skilled; public health problems, like obesity and diabetes, which can limit education and employment; the sheer size of the income gap between the rich which makes it harder to climb the proverbial income ladder when the rungs are farther apart; poverty, since those with low income have significantly lower rates of mobility than middle and higher income individuals. The factors which affect social mobility vary across the United States as does social mobility which in favored areas is much higher than in less favored areas.Education
Related: First-generation college students in the United StatesMultiple reports have found that education promotes economic mobility. The report “Pursuing the American Dream: Economic Mobility Across Generations” found that a four-year college degree promotes upward mobility from the bottom and prevents downward mobility from the middle and top. For instance, having a four-year college degree makes someone born into the bottom quintile of income three times more likely to climb all the way to the top as an adult.
Wages and earnings correlate with education. A 2009 survey of young adults who worked full-time throughout a full year, found the median income of whose without a high school diploma was below the poverty level for a family of four and less than half of what whose with a bachelor's degree earned.
| Educational Attainment | Young Adult Median Income |
| Master's degree or higher | $65,000 |
| Bachelor's degree | $51,800 |
| High School Diploma | $32,000 |
| No High School Diploma | $26,000 |
The difference has worsened since 1979 when the average college graduate made 38% more than the average high school graduate. By 2011 college graduates averaged made 75% more income. "Mobility" to the "class" of college graduates has declined. Those born with parents who graduated from college have far better odds of graduating from college than those born to high school graduates.
Some scholars have complained about the effect of education on mobility
“At virtually every level, education in America tends to perpetuate rather than compensate for existing inequalities. The reasons are threefold. First, the K through 12 education system is simply not very strong and thus is not an effective
way to break the link between parental background and a child’s eventual success.... Second, because K–12 education is financed largely at the state and local level, resources devoted to education are closely linked with where people live and with the property wealth of their neighbors. For this and other reasons, poor children tend to go to poor schools and more advantaged children to good schools.... Finally, access both to a quality preschool experience and to higher education continues to depend quite directly on family resources.”
Others have defended educational attainment as also freeing "individuals from the constraints of their social origins."
Poverty
Comparing the US with one high-mobility state, journalist Kevin Drum concluded that lack of mobility for the poorest children in the United States seems to be the primary reason for America's lag behind other developed countries. A study from the Economic Mobility Project found that growing up in a high-poverty neighborhood increases Americans’ risk of experiencing downward mobility and explains a sizable portion of the black-white downward mobility gap. The report's analysis also showed that black children who experience a reduction in their neighborhood's poverty rate have greater economic success in adulthood than black children who experience poverty rates that increase or are stable.Gender and race
Reports analyzing the economic mobility of African-Americans compared to that of whites have found stark differences. One report found that 53 percent of blacks born in the bottom income quintile remain there as adults, while only 33 percent of whites do. Research has also found that the children of black middle-class families are more likely to fall out of the middle class.Despite the increased presence of blacks and women in the work force over the years, women and non-whites hold jobs with less rank, authority, opportunity for advancement and pay than men and whites, a "glass ceiling" being said to prevent them from occupying more than a very small percentage in top managerial positions.
One explanation for this is seen in the networks of genders and ethnic groups. The more managers there are in an employees' immediate work environment, the higher the employees chances of interacting and spending time with high status/income employees, the more likely these employees are to be drawn on for promotion. As of the 1990s, the vast majority of all clerical and office workers are women, but made up less than half of all managers. Less than 15% of all managers were minorities, while roughly a quarter of all clerical and office employees were. The networks of women and minorities are simply not as strong as those of males and whites, putting them at a disadvantage in status/income mobility.
For women, another explanation for this "glass ceiling" effect in the American work force is the job-family trade off. While both men and women feel that a conflict exists between job and family, women with children, particularly married women, are more likely to either temporarily leave the labor force or cut back on employment by using flex time, working part-time or part of the year. Unfortunately, the outcome is lower mobility, since part-time employment is usually lower paying employment, with less chance of promotion into a higher status job or likelihood of a return to full-time employment for at least a few years.
Taking a leave from the work force tends to decrease human capital when it comes to finding a job. Women are also more likely than men to take leave from their jobs to care for others rather than themselves. Knowing this, employers are wary of hiring and promoting women in the work force.
Others have pointed out that men have statistically been willing to accept job conditions that women were not, such as working outside in extreme weather, working where you can become physically dirty on a regular basis, working more hours, etc. This is based on survey information, and shows that it is difficult to make direct comparisons. Conservatives also question the extent of gender discrimination arguing that competition between firms would lead them to bid up wages of any group if they provided the same or better value of work for less pay as employees.
Immigration
According to economist George J. Borjas, most immigrants to the US are at "a sizable earning disadvantage" compared to native-born workers, and the earnings of different groups of immigrants vary widely. Borjas found that intergenerational upward economic mobility averaging a 5% to 10% in increase in income from the first to the second generation of immigrants although there was wide variation among ethnic groups. Other research suggests that length of time resided in the U.S. narrows the occupational gap between Hispanic immigrants and non-Hispanic whites and U.S.-born Hispanic counterparts. Overcoming language barriers and adjusting to the new environment and culture to American society creates barriers for new immigrants, and "there is significant economic 'catching up' between the first and second generations". This intergenerational mobility includes poor as well as middle income groups, although among the high income Borjas noted a regression towards the mean or equalizing tendency in income/status, whereby children of very successful immigrants tended to have lower, not higher, incomes/status than their parents, becoming successful but not as successful.In particular, children coming from low-income immigrant families struggle with the disadvantages of their legal status more than the average American due to the level of stress they are exposed to, most specifically through the manner in which they are perceived as well as the way in which they see themselves and their future. Scholars that have studied the social characteristics that arise from having an immigrant status have defined this state of struggle as the "master status" that anchors their decisions in every aspect of their lives, often serving as a crippling agent in their individual developments. When looking specifically into the Latino population, there is an immense hesitance in pursuing education post-high school. According to a study conducted by Abrego in 2006, Latino immigrants without a legal status were more reluctant in pursuing higher education levels, including college as compared to their legal brethren. Most immigrants suffer silently in this manner due to a lack of a healthy immigrant niche construction through which they are able to assimilate accordingly and take advantage of the educational and social opportunities. In Norway for example, the government was able to facilitate increasing levels of re-distributive policies that allowed for a functional welfare state in which the immigrant population were able to lower the gaps of social class differences and becoming increasingly affluent in their ambitions of maintaining better lifestyles. Hence, social mobility is the deferred offspring of many welfare states including the United States due to their low public spending incentives. Studies conducted on education spending in the United States have shown that as compared to the private funding of education, only 2.7% of the nation's total GDP is spent towards public education.
Shifting the perspective to the effects immigration has placed on the existing economic status of the African-American population, there is yet even higher levels of economic bifurcations. While African-Americans occupied larger employment levels of at least 19 percent in sectors like transportation and hospital and social services during the 1990s, immigration caused a shift in this employment trend pushing them more towards private or self employment. One causing factor is the growing Puerto Rican and Mexican population who have increasingly found their employment niches in these specific sectors.Another pattern seen in the economic regression of African-Americans is the invisible role of education in expanding their career opportunities. Historical data shows that the African-American's future advances were highly discounted by scholars like Orley Ashenfelter and William A. Darity. Consensus studies conducted in the earlier periods of 1940 through 1960 also led many people to argue that black economic mobility through the route of education was closed.Comparatively, the 1990 Census as conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics showed that African-Americans made 63 percent less than the average American due to poor health conditions driven by their unequal social status.Displacement is seen even in low wage sector jobs, including janitorial positions that have become increasingly taken over by Mexicans and while African-Americas have still held these positions in the government, their economic position in considerably diminishing in this area. Hence, the economic stability of African-Americans are not only challenged through their social state but by the growing migration patterns as well.
Impact of incarceration
According to some researchers, America's high incarceration rate, and "War on Drugs" policies, have created an underclass with severely limited social mobility. Within the United States the prison population has been steadily increasing since the early 1970s and has now surpassed two million, making it the highest per capita rate in the world. This boom has been fueled to a large extent by the War on Drugs starting in the 1980s. In addition to the mobility handicaps of imprisonment, this "war" has effectively created a poor, immobile class by denying one of the most important tools for social mobility—education—in a number of ways- The drug war has combined with public school zero-tolerance policies to remove tens of thousands of adolescents from their public schools.
- Denial of higher education funding has been adopted as an additional punishment for drug offenders.
- The war on drugs siphons drug users out of society and into prison.